I once read that part of the education for the would-be members of the infamous Nazi SS involved giving the aspiring men a puppy each, at the beginning of the training. Then at the time of their graduation, they were ordered, “Strangle the puppy.” If they flinched, if they hesitated, if they declined, they flunked. The Nazis explicitly trained men to violate their conscience.

Solzhenitsyn talked about a “line through the heart” that people violate when they do what they know is wrong.

The Apostle Paul talked about those who have “seared their consciences.” It’s one and the same phenomenon.

One of the many tragedies of abortion is the way it has cheapened human life. First of all, I am not saying that those who are pro-abortion are Nazis or communists. But I am saying that abortion has blinded some people to dehumanize the unborn. A recent interview illustrates it.

A pro-life news source recently reported on a very disturbing online interview with an obscure radio host.

The host, who looks on the Internet video like he’s about 40, was asked to comment about a basketball star’s “abortion contract” with his ex-girlfriend. Apparently, the basketball star shelled out some $25,000 for this contract, stipulating that if the girlfriend got pregnant, she would abort.

The radio host approved of this contact and called the basketball star “a smart man.”

The interviewer (off-camera) asks how much an abortion costs. The radio host says that it depends on different factors. The only dollar figure he mentions is $1,200. If he is accurate in his claim, then he has supposedly paid for about 37 abortions.

The sick part about the interview is how casual he appears. He sounds like he could be talking about how much he would spend to paint the house with this type of paint versus that. It certainly doesn’t seem like he’s talking about human life – even the lives of his own sons and daughters.

He adds, “If you put $45,000 on the table in abortions, as opposed to 18 years – is [that] what you pay for a little f—ing rugrat, possibly $600,000? I think I’ve come out all right.”

I emailed that story to my friend, author Dr. Paul Kengor of Grove City College, the gifted writer on culture and history. He emailed me back: “Someday, when this man has a child that he and his wife intended, and looks into its eyes, holds it, feels it, feels for it, loves it, he’ll be very sorry and sickened at what he once said.”

As a new grandfather, I can’t believe how fantastic babies are. But to just think of them in pure economic terms is astounding. Sometimes pro-abortionists will argue to the confused young pregnant girl, “Now it’s going to cost you a gazillion dollars to raise this child. Do you have a gazillion dollars?”

What’s missing in that question, apart from the humanity of the unborn child, is that in life we generally have what we need when we need it. Certainly, that’s true in America.

When my wife had our first baby, she chose to stay home as a full-time mother. My salary at the time was so low. I look back and wonder how we made it. But God provided everything we need and then some. Through it all – and we have always tried to tithe – He has provided. As D. James Kennedy put it, “When God guides, He always provides.”

Scientists tell us we are “Homo Sapien Sapiens.” But some who have bought into the abortion mentality essentially say we are “Homo Economocus” – only of value based on money.

In contrast, God cares about human beings so much that He sent His one and only Son to pay for the sins of fallen humanity and to redeem those who will believe. We are of infinite value, so much so that Jesus Christ died and rose again on our behalf.

One of my all-time favorite quotes on abortion is from Mother Teresa, who said in 1994 at the big prayer breakfast in Washington, D.C.: “And if we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell others not to kill one another?” It’s a great question with no good answer.

Before abortion became legal by judicial fiat, we were told that child abuse would go down in the country because every child would be a wanted child. Instead, violence and child abuse have skyrocketed. Why? Because if you’re callous toward human life in the womb, why should you value it once the baby is born?